If Labour has decided now is the time to fight back against its critics, then perhaps a message from the grassroots has filtered to the top. The conference made it clear the desire for aggression came from the ground up, with delegates urging Ministers and members of the parliamentary party to stand up for Labour's performance in Government.

That's not to say the mood was downbeat. It was surprisingly positive for a party on 7 per cent in the most recent opinion poll, about the same level of support that caused the resignation of Eamon Gilmore last year.

One TD said the fight is there because members believe there is something to fight for: an economic recovery they hope will deliver a social dividend. The battle is, in reality, for a very small, yet significant, prize.

Labour will suffer heavy losses come the next election.

The working class vote which flocked to it in 2011, delivering 19 per cent and two seats in many Dublin constituencies, is gone. That vote is now the focus of a battle between Sinn Féin, the hard left and some Independents.

Labour is fighting for the extra 2 or 3 per cent which would return the party to its traditional support base of 10-12 per cent and between 15 and 20 Dáil seats.

Patrick Diamond, a former adviser to the New Labour government in Britain, pointed out at a fringe event that one of the worst mistakes parties of the centre left can make is to over-promise.

Labour made that mistake in 2010 and 2011 but its participation in the next government depends on heeding another aspect of Diamond’s advice: that the best promise that can be made to voters is one of slow, steady improvements rather than radical change.

Fine Gael and Labour are taking this path, and Labour's hope lies with generous Fine Gael voters who might support the junior party and some disillusioned voters flirting with Independents.

With that in mind, Joan Burton delivered a competent rallying cry to the base and a pitch to the voter for Labour as the party of working families. Her speech was strongest when at its most personal, such as meeting the mother of a gay son who wanted the same-sex marriage referendum passed.

There were a few markers put down for Fine Gael, such as directing childcare resources to a second free pre-school year and pitching for any money from the sale of AIB shares to be reinvested as part of a "social dividend" rather than used to pay off debt.

Yet, as was evident at Fine Gael's conference, both Government parties realise they must co-operate. Hence some Labour annoyance at Enda Kenny and Michael Noonan's recent statements reaching out to non-party deputies, and a feeling it gave Independents undue prominence at this stage in the electoral cycle.

Kenny and Noonan are thinking of a three-legged stool government as one outcome of the next election, much like that headed by Bertie Ahern between 1997 and 2002. But another Ahern template was on some Labour minds in Killarney.

The Coalition hopes this campaign will be much like campaign 2007, when voters returned a Government they didn't love but trusted with the economy. The attention of the electorate only fully turned to the choice in the last 10 days, with Fianna Fáil and Ahern the eventual beneficiaries as the pendulum swung a little more to the incumbent government each day of that campaign's final run-in.

The experience is still fresh in the minds of Fine Gael. As Fine Gael hopes to define itself against Sinn Féin, while marginalising Fianna Fáil, over the next year Labour must ensure that it stays in the game to figure in those final few days of campaign 2016.

That is the real fight for Joan Burton, her ministers, members and TDs – making sure you are the answer to somebody’s question in those last 10 days.